J PROD INNOV MANAG 2003;20:22–36
r 2003 Product Development & Management Association
Industrial Companies’ Evaluation Criteria in New Product
Development Gates
Susan Hart, Erik Jan Hultink, Nikolaos Tzokas, and Harry R. Commandeur
This article presents the results of a study on the evaluation criteria that companies
use at several gates in the NPD process. The findings from 166 managers suggest
that companies use different criteria at different NPD evaluation gates. While such
criteria as technical feasibility, intuition and market potential are stressed in the
early-screening gates of the NPD process, a focus on product performance, quality,
and staying within the development budget are considered of paramount importance
after the product has been developed. During and after commercialization,
customer acceptance and satisfaction and unit sales are primary considerations.
In addition, based on the performance dimensions developed by Griffin and Page
(1993), we derive patterns of use of various evaluative dimensions at the NPD
gates. Our results show that while the market acceptance dimension permeates
evaluation at all the gates in the NPD process, the financial dimension is especially
important during the business analysis gate and after-market launch. The product
performance dimension figures strongly in the product and market testing gates.
The importance of our additional set of criteria (i.e., product uniqueness, market
potential, market chance, technical feasibility, and intuition) decreases as the NPD
process unfolds. Overall the above pattern of dimensions’ usage holds true for both
countries in which we collected our data, and across firms of different sizes, holding
different market share positions, with different NPD drivers, following different
innovation strategies, and developing different types of new products. The results
also are stable for respondents that differ in terms of expertise and functional
background.
The results of this study provide useful guidelines for project selection and
evaluation purposes and therefore can be helpful for effective investment decisionmaking at gate-meetings and for project portfolio management. We elaborate on
these guidelines for product developers and marketers wishing to employ evaluation
criteria in their NPD gates, and we discuss directions for further research.
Introduction
R
ecent investigations of new product developments (NPD) have reinforced the concept
of a process based on a series of develop-
Address correspondence to Susan Hart, Department of Marketing,
University of Strathclyde, Stenhouse Building, 173 Cathedral Street,
Glasgow G4 0RQ, Scotland, UK. Phone: +44-141-548-4927; E-mail:
susan.hart@strath.ac.uk.
ment stages interpolated by a series of evaluative
stages [9,31,37]. Preceded by the formulation of new
product strategy (also coined Protocol [7] and
Product Innovation Charter [12]), the development
stages include idea generation, concept development,
building the business case, product development,
market testing, and market launch [7,13]. After each
of these stages an evaluation takes place, essentially to
determine whether the new product should advance
INDUSTRIAL COMPANIES’ EVALUATION CRITERIA IN NEW PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT GATES
BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH
Susan Hart is vice dean of research at Strathclyde Business School.
In addition, Professor Hart has worked for a variety of private
sector companies, ranging from multinational to small manufacturers in consumer and industrial enterprises. She sits on the
executive committee of the Academy of Marketing and recently was
elected to the Senate of the Chartered Institute of Marketing.
Furthermore she edits the Journal of Marketing Management and is
a member of the Journal of Product Innovation Management. She
also acts as reviewer for seven other academic journals and is a
proposal reviewer for four grant-awarding bodies.
Erik Jan Hultink is an Associate Professor of Marketing at the
Faculty of Design, Engineering and Production of Delft University
of Technology, where he received his PhD. He received his MSc in
Economics from the University of Amsterdam. His research interest
concentrates on launch strategies and new product development
methods and measurement. He has published on these topics in
journals such as the International Journal of Research in Marketing, the Journal of Product Innovation Management and the Journal
of High Technology Management Research.
Nikos Tzokas is Professor of Marketing at the University of East
Anglia. He graduated and received an MBA from the Athens
University of Economics in Greece. He was awarded a PhD in 1993
from the School of Management at the University of Bath.
Formerly at the University of Strathclyde and the University of
Stirling, he joined the School of Management in November 2000.
His research areas of interest include Relationship Marketing,
Customer Relationship Management, New Product Development,
and Sales Management. He has published widely on these issues in
journals such as The Journal of Selling and Major Account
Management, Industrial Marketing Management, International
Business Review and the Journal of Product Innovation Management
and the Journal of Marketing Management.
Harry R. Commandeur holds the Dr. F.J.D. Goldschmeding Chair
of Economics for Increasing Returns at Nyenrode University,
Breukelen, The Netherlands. He also teaches at the Department of
Marketing and Organization, Faculty of Economics, Erasmus
University Rotterdam, The Netherlands.
further or should be terminated. These evaluation
stages have been termed gates [7] or convergent points
[21]. Such an evaluation requires the collection and
consideration of information and the application of
criteria against which this information can be
assessed.
Much research into NPD has dealt with the
techniques used for the collection of relevant information [30,31], yet more articles have been published
regarding the intricacies of disseminating and using
such information [28]. In contrast, the subject of
criteria to be used in evaluating the information
inputs to NPD is scant, and where it does exist, it
tends to be confined to articles dealing with the idea
and concept screening gates [8,14].
The criteria act as guideposts against which the
performance of the NPD effort can be evaluated and
adjustments can be made if necessary [34]. To the
J PROD INNOV MANAG
2003;20:22–36
23
extent that these criteria are derived from the
corporate and new product strategy of the firm and
are focused to the specific requirements of each stage
of the NPD process, they can help reduce managerial
uncertainty and can identify areas where additional
attention and resources are needed. Furthermore,
they can strengthen the strategic decision-making
process of the firm by helping management develop
and can deploy the right competencies and resources
across the NPD effort. As Hauser and Zettelmeyer
[23] maintain, ‘‘Select the right metric for each
activity and you can encourage the right decisions
and actions by scientists, engineers, and managers’’
(p. 32). That said, key writers observe that the ‘‘go/
kill’’ decision points often are missing from representations and studies of the NPD process [7,34].
Motivated by the important role of criteria
throughout the NPD effort, we attempt here to shed
additional light on the nature and utilization of these
criteria in contemporary industrial firms. The aim of
this article is to examine how the use of different
criteria varies at different gates of the NPD process.
The remainder of this article is divided into four
sections. First, we review the NPD literature in order
to define our conceptual framework for study and to
specify our research questions based on this conceptualization. Second, we describe a survey of the
procedures of 166 industrial firms for evaluating new
product projects as they evolve from incomplete ideas
to nascent products and thus become increasingly
resource-hungry [9,30,36]. Then we present results of
the study, and last, we discuss their research and
managerial implications.
Background and Research Questions
Despite the changes in the conceptualization of NPD
projects that have taken place over the past 25 years,
evaluation of the development project as it journeys
from intangible idea to actual customer offering
remains central [16,27,35]. Indeed, much research
demonstrates that a phased review process commonly
is used [6,7,17]. Even research disputing the efficacy of
the traditional linear, sequential representation of the
NPD process tends to recognize the central role of
evaluation and the reevaluation of the development
project as it progresses [3,20,21]. Common to all
phased review representations of the NPD process is
the notion that it is made up of development phases
24
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2003;20:22–36
(i.e., development stages) and evaluation phases (i.e.,
corresponding evaluation gates).
Evaluation within a gate includes techniques that
may be repeated as alternative or refined design
concepts of product configurations are developed.
Different techniques are used to assess the commercial and technical feasibility of the developing
product. The commercial set of techniques includes
beta-testing, perceptual mapping, conjoint analysis,
Quality Function Deployment (QFD), A-T-R models, break-even analysis, and sensitivity testing.
In addition to these commercial evaluation techniques, technical evaluation sets include the assessment
of design, production, and functional feasibility and
specifications. In short, as well as commercial
evaluation and reevaluation, it is of critical importance to evaluate the function, form, and production
of the new product project.
Each gate is a different combination of technical
and commercial evaluation sets. Idea screening is the
first of a series of evaluations, beginning when the
collection of new product ideas is complete. It is an
initial assessment to weed out impractical ideas. This
initial evaluation cannot be very sophisticated, as it is
concerned with identifying ideas that can be developed into concepts and can be evaluated for their
technical feasibility and market potential. As the
development project proceeds, the information
collected regarding both technical and commercial
feasibility becomes more copious, and because
it relates less to something vague and abstract and
more to something tangible and complete, the
information has greater potential for being reliable
and valid [7]. Thus, when a project reaches market
testing, the information yielded will be more complete
and will encompass customer opinions, buying
behavior, operation of the product in use, production
and delivery, and communication to its target market.
Yet despite the recognition that the amount and
quality of information increases incrementally
through each stage of the NPD process, the criteria
used to evaluate the information remain unclear. It
has been 15 years since Ronkainen’s [33] observation
that ‘‘a major issue that has been overlooked is
whether or not the same set of criteria is used at every
decision-making point or whether the weights of
individual criteria vary from one point to another’’
(pp. 171–72).
Apart from this one study, however, there has been
little further light shed on this matter. Ronkainen [32]
found that in four industrial companies, decision-
S. HART ET AL.
makers used three sets of criteria for evaluative
purposes: product, market, and finance, with the last
category being of greatest importance. Further, he
found that market criteria were determinants of the
go/no-go decision at the concept screening gate and
that during the product testing gate, product-related
criteria took over as being more important. Finally,
he suggested that financial criteria were stressed more
in the last two gates of the NPD process, which he
defined as scale-up and standardization.
Despite the important contribution of these findings to our understanding of how NPD processes are
applied within firms, they are limited in some respects.
First, the small scale of the study, coupled with its age
and restriction to large, American firms, make it
unwise to assume general applicability of the findings
to NPD evaluation. Second, the conceptualization of
the process used, while relevant for the four firms
investigated, makes no reference to common frameworks used to depict the work of new product
developers, and it is therefore difficult to slot the
implications into the mainstream of NPD research
and theory.
A further knowledge gap regarding evaluation
criteria relates to the evaluative dimensions to be used
during the evaluation gates. With the exception of
those articles dealing with idea and concept screening,
or post-launch evaluation, the literature as yet has not
made a consistent attempt to provide insights into
how the evaluative dimensions are deployed throughout the NPD process [8,18,24]. Below, we argue that
criteria related to new product performance measures
can become the basis for examining the evaluative
dimensions for NPD gates.
The measurement of new product performance has
been the subject of significant research studies within
the past 10 years [18,19,20,24]. Such research has
affirmed that there are several dimensions of NPD
performance, including technical-, financial-, and
market-based performance [18,20]. The findings of
these studies can be linked to the criteria used in the
monitoring of an NPD project. In other words, if
there are different kinds of new product performance
outcomes to be achieved, then the use of evaluative
criteria related to the performance dimensions would
be an appropriate means of steering the NPD process
through the go/no-go evaluation gates.
More specifically, as new product performance on
one dimension may be achieved at the expense of
performance on another, it is crucial that the
evaluative criteria at the gates mirror those used to
INDUSTRIAL COMPANIES’ EVALUATION CRITERIA IN NEW PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT GATES
assess the performance of the product once launched.
In our research, we sought explicitly to incorporate
the dimensions of new product performance detailed
in the literature in investigating how NPD projects
are evaluated throughout their development. In short,
we have synthesized the concepts of evaluative criteria
and performance indicators.
The work of Hauser [22] and Hauser and
Zettelmeyer [23] supports our approach. Using a
three-tier metaphor to categorize different types of
research, development, and engineering (RD&E)
activities (i.e., projects, programs, and explorations)
in 10 research-intensive organizations, Hauser and
Zettelmeyer [23] found that the appropriateness of
different metrics varies for different types of RD&E
projects. They concluded that ‘‘metrics that are best
for one type of activity may be counter-productive for
another type’’ (p. 38) and warned that ‘‘if a firm
applies the same metrics throughout the RD&E
process it does not get the most out of its
technological efforts’’ (p. 33). The use of the threetier metaphor by the researchers above highlights the
fact that metrics or evaluative criteria should be
aligned to the different objectives and therefore to the
different requirements of each type. However, Hauser
and Zettelmeyer [23] examined only the use of metrics
for different types of RD&E processes and not at
different gates of the process. Nevertheless, ‘‘most
firms had a concept that the management of
technology varied depending on the stage of the
process’’ (p. 33). Our study has been developed to
address this level of detail.
Drawing on the foregoing review of the relevant
literature, our specific research questions that guided
our study were as follows:
(1) Which criteria are used most frequently at the
NPD evaluation gates?
(2) Which evaluative dimensions are used most
frequently at the NPD evaluation gates?
We assessed the results for these two research
questions in two separate countries to examine the
stability of the findings. Moreover, we were interested
in exploring how a firm’s profile was related to the
nature and number of criteria and dimensions used at
the NPD gates. Specifically, we examined firm-level
factors (firm size, market share position, and NPD
driver), NPD program level factors (innovation
strategy and product newness), and respondent
factors (experience in the firm and functional background).
J PROD INNOV MANAG
2003;20:22–36
25
Research Method
Our research findings are based on a survey of 166
managers from Dutch and UK companies that are
developing and manufacturing industrial goods. This
research instrument was used to collect information
on criteria that companies use at various evaluation
gates in the NPD process. In addition, the survey
collected background and demographic data on the
respondent and the firm. The survey was pretested in
two rounds (with four companies in each round).
Interviews with six managers after the second round
indicated that the meanings of the questions and
answer categories were clear and that the survey could
be completed without difficulties.
The questionnaire originally was developed in
Dutch for data collection in The Netherlands and
subsequently was translated by a native speaker in
English (and was back-translated by a different
translator in Dutch as a check) for data collection
in the UK. The procedure of collecting the data was
identical in both countries. All potential respondents
were prenotified by phone by one of the project
members. They introduced themselves as contributors
to an international study on NPD evaluation criteria.
Preliminary notification by phone was used to solicit
cooperation, to check whether the company had
developed and launched any new products recently,
to identify the respondent who had been responsible
for the NPD effort, and to increase the response rate
[39]. Accordingly, questionnaires were mailed out to
those identified as having primary responsibility for
NPD in each firm, by name. More details on the data
collection in the two countries are provided below.
The Netherlands. We used a CD-ROM Business
Directory (by Generator BV) to develop a sample
frame of 1,927 manufacturing companies with more
than 20 employees in some selected industries
(chemicals, medical equipment, electronics, and computers). From a total of 509 randomly selected
companies contacted by phone, 228 companies agreed
to participate in the research and received the mail
questionnaire. Thirty-four companies had not developed any new products in the last five years; 134
companies only assembled or sold new products but
did not develop them; 52 companies were not
interested in participating in the research; and 61 of
the companies could not be reached or had gone
bankrupt. This procedure and an additional reminder
postcard led to 134 usable questionnaires, an effective
response rate of 59 percent (of those who agreed to
26
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2003;20:22–36
S. HART ET AL.
Table 1. Profile of Dutch and UK Samples
The Netherlands
Number
Percent
United Kingdom
Number
Total Sample
Percent
Number
Percent
Firm level factors
Number of Employees
Less than 50
32
33
4
6
36
22
51 to 100
29
30
8
12
37
22
101 to 1000
34
35
43
62
77
46
More than 1000
2
2
14
20
16
10
1
26
27
22
32
48
29
2–4
50
53
35
51
85
52
5 or Lower
19
20
12
17
31
19
Market driven
80
84
50
72
130
79
Technology driven
15
16
19
28
34
21
Market Share Position
NPD Driver
NPD Program level factors
Innovation Strategy
Technological innovator
47
49
39
57
86
52
Fast imitator
38
39
16
23
54
33
Cost reducer
12
12
14
20
26
16
Line addition
16
17
23
33
39
24
Improvement
65
67
42
61
107
64
Completely new
16
17
4
6
20
12
NP Newness
Respondent factors
Duration of Employment
Less than 1 year
8
8
5
7
13
8
1 to 3 years
11
11
12
17
23
14
3 to 5 years
17
18
13
19
30
18
More than 5 years
61
63
39
57
100
60
1 new product
10
10
6
9
16
10
2–4 new products
43
44
30
43
73
44
5–9 new products
19
20
19
28
38
23
More than 10
25
26
14
20
39
23
Number of NPD Projects Involved
Functional Area of Respondent
Marketing/sales
16
17
43
62
59
36
R&D/development
57
59
11
16
68
41
General management
19
20
12
17
31
19
Other
4
4
3
4
7
4
INDUSTRIAL COMPANIES’ EVALUATION CRITERIA IN NEW PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT GATES
participate). We checked the responses from early and
late respondents to assess nonresponse bias [1]. No
significant differences were found between both sets
of respondents thus minimizing concerns for nonresponse bias. To obtain a homogeneous sample of
respondents, we will use only the responses from the
companies who developed and launched new products for industrial customers (N597). Table 1
contains the profile of the Dutch sample.
United Kingdom. We used the FAME CD-ROM
Business Directory (by Bureau van Dyke) to develop
a sample frame of 500 manufacturing companies with
more than 20 employees in the same selected
industries (chemicals, medical equipment, electronics
and computers).
From this original sample frame of 500 firms, after
initial contact by phone, 48 were excluded because of a
policy of company confidentiality. A further 14 had
not been engaged in any NPD efforts and therefore
were excluded. Of the remaining 438 respondents that
agreed to participate, 100 returned the questionnaire,
thus providing a response rate of 23 percent. Again,
nonresponse bias was examined and was not found to
be a major problem [1]. To also obtain a homogeneous
sample of UK respondents, only the responses from
industrial companies were included (N569). Table 1
also provides an overview of the UK sample.
Questionnaire. The questionnaire focused on the 15
core project-level indicators of new product performance [18,19]. Since Griffin and Page [18,19] were
mainly interested in measuring new product performance after launch, we also scanned the literature for
criteria that are used in earlier gates of the NPD
process. Five additional criteria were identified:
product uniqueness, market potential, marketing
chance,
technical
feasibility,
and
intuition
[2,11,15,26,32].
By comparing seven models of the NPD process
[4,6,9,13,25,30,36], six distinct evaluation gates were
selected: idea screening, concept screening, business
analysis, product testing, analyzing test market
results, and after-launch assessment. Hultink and
Robben [24] made a distinction between measuring
new product performance in the short term and in the
long term after launch. They found that the
importance attached by managers to the indicators
of new product performance depended strongly on
this time perspective. Therefore, we decided to include
the short-term as well as the long-term performance
assessment. Hence, for each of the seven evaluation
gates, respondents assessed which of the 20 evaluation
J PROD INNOV MANAG
2003;20:22–36
27
criteria were used. Respondents were asked to answer
the questions in relation to representative new
products that they had developed and had launched
in the previous five years. The ability of the
respondents to provide well-informed answers to
these questions was checked by means of the number
of NPD projects they were involved in the previous
five years as well as by the duration of their
employment with the firm. It was found that 90
percent of the respondents were involved with the
development of more than two new products during
the previous five years and that 78 percent of them
had been with the firm for more than three years (see
Table 1). These findings increased our confidence in
the ability of the respondents to provide wellinformed answers regarding their firms and associated
NPD practices. Respondents received, along with the
questionnaire, detailed definitions and a diagrammatic representation of the NPD stages and evaluation gates. These definitions and diagram were
pretested with six respondents in four different
companies, increasing the face validity of our instrument as it communicated a consistent picture of NPD
stages and gates across the respondents. The pretest
showed that it was not necessary to provide definitions for the 20 evaluation criteria, as the respondents
felt comfortable with the criteria as stated and
considered that definitions for the criteria were
superfluous and even distracting.
Analysis and Results
This section consists of three parts. First, the most
frequently used evaluation criteria at the seven NPD
gates will be presented. Then, we will focus on the
patterns of use of various evaluative dimensions.
Finally, we will test whether any differences exist with
regard to the evaluative dimensions used per NPD
gate for different subgroups of respondents.
Evaluation Criteria at NPD Gates
For those respondents who said they evaluated
the new product in a certain gate, we calculated the
percentage of those firms that used any of the
20 evaluation criteria. Table 2 shows the results
from this analysis; shadowed boxes include the
percentage of firms that exceeds our cut-off point of
50 percent, indicating what we regard as the most
28
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2003;20:22–36
S. HART ET AL.
Table 2. Percentage of Companies Using Evaluation Criteria at NPD Gates
Marketing Chance
Technical Feasibility
Intuition
51
Market Potential
19
Product Uniqueness
8
Time-to-Market
27
Quality
5
Product Performance
24
Introduced in Time
11
Stays within Budget
38
Margin
IRR/ROI
31
Profit Objectives
27
Break-Even time
24
Sales in Units
31
Market Share
46
Sales Growth
Idea Screening
Sales Objectives
NPD
Evaluation
Gates
Customer Satisfaction
Evaluation
Criteria
Customer Acceptance
The Netherlands
36
17
51
52
28
70
54
Concept Screening
48
37
11
1
4
14
6
10
9
8
9
14
48
36
9
18
22
14
47
20
Business Analysis
31
22
51
38
37
62
27
46
26
46
16
22
25
18
20
20
50
39
27
20
Product Testing
36
37
6
2
5
22
11
9
6
16
39
34
65
67
21
28
10
6
36
20
Test Market
68
66
9
7
12
24
8
12
8
16
17
29
63
56
18
23
19
17
43
19
Post-Launch S/T
54
59
41
28
33
59
15
41
19
44
12
32
45
35
14
26
35
22
8
16
Post-Launch L/T
31
52
38
42
36
51
7
38
17
40
10
9
31
23
4
14
27
13
3
13
United Kingdom
Customer Acceptance
Customer Satisfaction
Sales Objectives
Sales Growth
Market Share
Sales in Units
Break-Even time
Profit Objectives
IRR/ROI
Margin
Stays within Budget
Introduced in Time
Product Performance
Quality
Time-to-Market
Product Uniqueness
Market Potential
Marketing Chance
Technical Feasibility
Intuition
Evaluation
Criteria
Idea Screening
54
38
46
27
27
27
11
32
16
35
19
14
33
22
35
75
73
40
75
62
Concept Screening
60
45
20
10
10
23
10
15
8
23
25
22
45
32
23
42
53
35
70
28
Business Analysis
31
25
60
52
55
70
42
67
67
73
31
31
27
22
46
36
69
48
33
19
Product Testing
45
39
20
14
13
16
13
20
16
27
59
45
73
69
47
42
30
17
59
19
Test Market
77
66
27
16
16
20
16
20
17
25
33
41
83
79
36
36
38
19
48
11
Post-Launch S/T
77
75
70
64
52
71
32
57
29
71
16
43
54
61
32
32
36
23
9
14
Post-Launch L/T
57
76
68
72
74
68
28
72
47
79
6
13
55
64
0
30
32
17
8
8
NPD
Evaluation
Gates
frequently used NPD evaluation criteria. As expected,
some criteria were used more often in the early
gates of the NPD process (for example, technical
feasibility and intuition), while other criteria were
more often used in later gates of the process (for
example, sales in units, meeting profit objectives and
margin). Some criteria were frequently used in only
one or two of the evaluation gates (for example,
intuition and product uniqueness), while other
criteria were frequently used in at least three of the
seven evaluation gates (for example, customer satisfaction, sales in units and product performance).
Below, we will discuss the three most frequently used
criteria at the different NPD evaluation gates (see
Table 3).
Idea screening. Technical feasibility is the most
frequently used criterion for idea screening purposes.
Intuition also plays a major role (see Table 2). This is
INDUSTRIAL COMPANIES’ EVALUATION CRITERIA IN NEW PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT GATES
J PROD INNOV MANAG
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Table 3. Most Frequently Used Evaluation Criteria at NPD Gates
The Netherlands
Indicator
United Kingdom
Percent of use
Indicator
Percent of use
Idea Screening
Technical feasibility
70
Technical feasibility
75
Intuition
54
Product uniqueness
75
Market potential
52
Market potential
73
Customer acceptance
48
Technical feasibility
70
Product performance
48
Customer acceptance
60
Technical feasibility
47
Market potential
53
Concept Screening
Business Analysis
Sales in units
62
Margin
73
Sales objectives
51
Sales in units
70
Market potential
50
Market potential
69
Quality
67
Product performance
73
Product performance
65
Quality
69
Stays within budget
39
Stays within budget
59
Product Testing
Analyze Test-Market Results
Customer acceptance
67
Product performance
73
Customer satisfaction
65
Quality
69
63
Customer acceptance
59
Product performance
Post Launch Evaluation, Short Term
Customer satisfaction
59
Customer acceptance
77
Sales in units
59
Customer satisfaction
75
Customer acceptance
54
Sales in units
71
Post Launch Evaluation, Long Term
Customer satisfaction
52
Margin
79
Sales in units
51
Customer satisfaction
76
Sales growth
42
Market share
74
not surprising given the large uncertainties and the
lack of relevant, valid information at this stage. In
addition, market potential and product uniqueness
are assessed. It seems that firms in our sample follow
a balanced approach at this gate by evaluating both
technical and market aspects of new ideas.
Concept screening. Table 3 shows that firms most
frequently used customer acceptance, product performance, and technical feasibility at this gate. UK
companies also test the market potential of the new
product concept. Of interest is the lack of use of any
financial criteria in the first two evaluation gates of
the NPD process.
Business analysis. After the business analysis is
performed, large investments are needed to proceed
to the next stage of the NPD process. Hence, it is
critical to forecast the sales and profit levels for the
proposed new product. Accordingly, in the business
analysis gate, companies tend to use sales criteria
(such as sales in units) instead of product-level
criteria. Market potential also figures heavily, as
there is a clear association between sales and market
potential. UK companies also evaluate the product’s
margin extensively.
Product testing. After the product development
stage, it is of paramount importance to check whether
the new product has met its objectives from a
technical point of view. To prevent ‘‘technical dogs’’
from being developed [5], not surprisingly, the most
frequently used criteria in this stage have to do with
30
J PROD INNOV MANAG
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product performance and quality. Firms also are keen
to measure whether they stay within the development
budget at this gate.
Analyze test market results. After the market
testing stage in the NPD process, companies measure
the performance and quality of the new product
again. In addition, customer reactions to the new
product are collected. By evaluating technical aspects
as well as customer acceptance and satisfaction,
companies apparently try to prevent launching
‘‘better mousetraps that nobody wants’’ [5].
Post-launch evaluation short term. This gate is the
first real test for the new product in the market. Now
it becomes clear whether the product will be accepted
in the marketplace and whether any profit will be
made on the new product investments. In addition, it
is the market launch stage where positive or negative
word of mouth owing to customer satisfaction can
build or break the new product’s success. Hence, the
most frequently used evaluation criteria measure the
customer acceptance of the new product, customer
satisfaction, and sales levels.
Post-launch evaluation long term. At this time the
new product should be well established in the
marketplace. Initial problems to the new product
have been sorted out. Performance now is assessed
mainly in terms of sales and market share. However,
it is interesting to note that customer satisfaction also
is being assessed in this gate. This, we argue, is
important since according to Woodruff [38] changes
in customer expectations may influence the level of
satisfaction they get from a product. Firms, therefore,
need to be alert to detect such changes, which, if
surpassed, may undermine their competitive position.
Firms in the UK also frequently measure the new
product’s margin at this gate.
Evaluative Dimensions at NPD Gates
To address research question 2, our objective was to
move away from single criteria and examine what is
happening in a broader context—for example, do
companies show a usage preference of some evaluative
dimensions over others at different gates in the NPD
process? As mentioned earlier, the 20 criteria used in
our study correspond to the 15 project-level criteria
identified by Griffin and Page [18,19] and include five
more because our study examined the entire range of
the NPD process and not just after-launch performance. In the present step of our analysis, we used
S. HART ET AL.
Griffin and Page’s [18] three dimensions of performance (market acceptance, financial performance,
and product performance), as well as the additional
indicators we introduced in a category of their own
(additional indicators). Table 4 presents the results of
this analysis. Each cell in Table 4 depicts the number
of evaluation criteria (from each of the four dimensions) used per NPD gate. The total average number
of criteria for each dimension used throughout the
entire process is shown (column totals) as is the total
average use of criteria for each dimension per stage
(row totals). Furthermore, all are broken down for the
Dutch and UK sample and statistical significance of
differences tested using t-tests.
Table 4 shows that the market acceptance dimension permeates all the evaluation gates in the NPD
process, indicating the market orientation of these
firms. The financial dimension emerges prominently
only during the business analysis evaluation and after
market launch in the short and long term. The
product performance dimension, despite figuring in
almost every evaluation gate, becomes prominent
during the product testing and test market evaluation
gates. Finally, our dimension containing additional
criteria shows a fair use over the entire range of the
NPD evaluation gates yet with prominence during
the idea-screening gate. These results are consistent
for both countries in which we collected our data. In
fact, only six (out of 29) tests between the two
countries appeared to be statistically significant (see
Table 4).
We proceeded to examine the emerging patterns in
evaluative dimensions over the NPD evaluation gates.
Figure 1 presents four graphical representations of
the number of criteria used per dimension over the
NPD evaluation gates. Examining this figure, it
becomes apparent again that the two country samples
show a similar pattern of usage, although firms in the
UK generally use more criteria, an observation
strengthened by the fact that one of the six
statistically significant differences between the two
countries was the total average number of criteria
used for each stage throughout over the entirety of
the evaluative gates. Finally, in order to compare the
relative usage of the four dimensions over the NPD
evaluation gates, we calculated the standardized
number of criteria per dimension used in each
evaluation gate (i.e., number of criteria per dimension
used divided by the number of criteria in each
dimension). Figure 2 provides a graphical representation of the results of this analysis.
INDUSTRIAL COMPANIES’ EVALUATION CRITERIA IN NEW PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT GATES
J PROD INNOV MANAG
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31
Table 4. Number of Criteria per Evaluative Dimension at the NPD Gates
Market Acceptance
Financial Performance
Product Performance
Additional Indicators
Total
Market Acceptance
Financial Performance
Product Performance
Additional Indicators
Total
Evaluation
Dimensions
Idea Screening
2.0
0.7
1.3
2.5
6.5
2.2
0.9
1.2
3.2
7.6
Concept Screening
1.2
0.3
1.2
1.2
3.9
1.7
0.6
1.5
2.3
6.1
Business Analysis
2.4
1.5
1.0
1.6
6.5
2.9
2.5
1.6
2.1
9.0
Product Testing
1.1
0.4
2.3
1.3
5.1
1.5
0.8
2.9
1.7
6.9
Test Market
1.8
0.4
1.8
1.2
5.3
2.2
0.8
2.7
1.5
7.2
Post-Launch S/T
2.7
1.2
1.4
1.1
6.4
4.1
1.9
2.1
1.1
9.2
Post-Launch L/T
2.5
1.0
0.8
0.7
5.0
4.1
2.3
1.4
0.9
8.7
13.71
5.58
9.8
9.62
38.71
18.7
9.8
13.4
12.8
54.7
NPD
Evaluation
Gates
Total
Average
5.53
7.8
Note: Entries in bold indicate a significant difference in the number of criteria used per dimension between The Netherlands and the UK. We
adjusted the a level for the number of tests. For all significant differences, means were higher for the UK.
The pattern of relative usage of the evaluative
dimensions over the NPD gates was identical in both
countries. Figure 2 therefore shows the relative usage
of these dimensions for the total sample. Our set of
additional indicators, which included criteria such as
product uniqueness, technical feasibility, and intuition, is used most frequently at the idea and conceptscreening gates. Then, the financial performance and
market acceptance dimensions take over at the
business analysis gate. Assessing product performance dominates the product testing and test-market
gates during which the financial performance dimension is largely ignored. The fact that financial
performance hardly is assessed at the test-market
gate is somewhat surprising, as it suggests that only
the functional performance and market acceptance
are assessed without their attendant financial implications. Thereafter however, the market acceptance and
financial performance dimensions resume their primacy over the other dimensions as the NPD process
draws nearer to its conclusion.
Patterns of usage in Figure 2 corroborate our
earlier findings and provide support to the work of
Ronkainen [32] and Hultink and Robben [24].
Indeed, the latter authors found that the importance
of financial criteria is increased in the long-term
assessment of NPD success. The usage pattern of
financial criteria in Figure 2 supports this variation
that also is evident in Ronkainen’s [32] work.
However, whereas Ronkainen [32] found that market
acceptance criteria scored lower in usage than
financial performance criteria in the concept-screening gate, our findings suggest a different pattern.
Figure 2 shows that market acceptance criteria score
consistently is higher than financial criteria in every
evaluation gate apart from the business analysis
evaluation. As explained earlier, this may be an
indication of the higher market orientation of firms in
our sample as compared to those studied by
Ronkainen [32] in 1985. This would be consistent
with the development in the last decade of the concept
of market orientation, which might be expected to
filter into numerous management practices, including
the evaluative dimensions of the NPD process,
producing a stronger emphasis on market reaction
as a primary indication of the ‘‘green light’’ throughout the development process.
Given the paucity of previous empirical research
on the evaluation gates in NPD, looking at what
might account for different usage of evaluative
dimensions may lead to greater insights as to when
and why some dimensions should be deployed. We
32
J PROD INNOV MANAG
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S. HART ET AL.
Number of Criteria
Country Variations in Market Acceptance
6. 0
5. 0
4. 0
3. 0
2. 0
1. 0
0. 0
Netherlands
U.K.
Idea
Screening
Concept
Screening
Business
Analysis
Product
Testing
Test Market
Post-Launch
S/T
Post-Launch
L/T
NPD Evaluation Gates
Number of Criteria
Country Variations in Financial Performance
4. 0
3. 0
Netherlands
2. 0
U.K.
1. 0
0. 0
Idea
Screening
Concept
Screening
Business
Analysis
Product
Testing
Test Market
Post-Launch
S/T
Post-Launch
L/T
NPD Evaluation Gates
Number of Criteria
Country Variations in Product Performance
5 .0
4 .0
3 .0
Netherlands
2 .0
U.K.
1 .0
0 .0
Idea
Screening
Concept
Screening
Business
Analysis
Product
Testing
Test Market
Post-Launch
S/T
Post-Launch
L/T
NPD Evaluation Gates
Number of Criteria
Country Variations in Additional indicators
5.0
4.0
3.0
Netherlands
2.0
U.K.
1.0
0.0
Idea
Screening
Concept
Screening
Business
Analysis
Product
Testing
Test Market
Post-Launch
S/T
Post-Launch
L/T
NPD Evaluation Gates
Figure 1. Number of Evaluation Criteria Used per Dimension over the NPD Gates
therefore decided to investigate the impact of the
sample profile variables to examine the stability of the
patterns of evaluation.
The Impact of Profile Variables on the Evaluative
Dimensions Used
Three sets of profile variables were analyzed for
evidence of changing patterns of evaluation. These
profile variables included firm-level factors (size,
market share position, and NPD driver), NPD
program level factors (innovation strategy and
product newness), and respondent factors (experience
and functional background). Table 5 shows the
number of significant differences (out of 28 tests)
for each of these sets of factors. The tests used were
either t-tests or one-way analysis of variance,
depending upon the number of groups used to
describe the profile variables (see Table 1). Of the
firm-level factors, only one difference among firms of
different sizes was found to be significant statistically:
At the business analysis stage, larger firms used more
product performance criteria than the smallest
companies in the sample. This, however, may be a
chance finding. In addition, firms with different
market share positions tended to use the same
INDUSTRIAL COMPANIES’ EVALUATION CRITERIA IN NEW PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT GATES
J PROD INNOV MANAG
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33
Standardized Number of
Criteria per Dimension
Variations in Performance Dimensions
over NPD Evaluation Gates
0.6
0.5
Market Acceptance
Financial Performance
Product Performance
Additional Indicators
0.4
0.3
0.2
0.1
0.0
Idea
Concept
Screening Screening
Business
Analysis
Product Test Market Post-Launch Post-Launch
Testing
S/T
L/T
NPD Evaluation Gates
Figure 2. Relative Use of Evaluative Dimensions over NPD Gates (for total sample)
number of criteria per dimension, and when the
sample was subdivided into those firms that were
technologically driven and those that were market
driven, again the number of criteria used for each
evaluative dimension showed no change. Similarly,
when we examined the NPD program-level factors,
no differences in the number of evaluation criteria per
dimension were found.
Table 5. Differences in Number of Criteria Used per
Dimension across Subgroups*
Number of
Differences
Profile Variables
(Out of 28 tests)
Firm-Level Factors
Number of employees
1
Market share position
0
NPD driver
0
NPD Program-Level Factors
Innovation strategy
0
Product newness
0
Finally, when looking at the respondent factors,
the number of evaluation criteria used per dimension
did not fluctuate with different levels of respondent
expertise. A slight difference was found in four (out of
28) tests with respect to the functional area of the
respondent. Specifically, at the idea-screening gate,
marketing/sales respondents used more market acceptance criteria than research and development
(R&D) respondents. At the concept-screening gate,
marketing/sales respondents used more criteria for
the product performance dimension, while at the
product testing and long-term post-launch evaluations marketing/sales respondents used more of the
additional criteria. The number of differences, however, is so low that we cannot be sure that they are not
merely chance results. Overall, given the vast number
of tests that were insignificant, we have no strong
evidence in support of firm size, market position,
NPD program type, or allegiances of the respondents
being significant moderators of any variations in the
evaluative dimensions used at different gates of the
NPD process. That said, the results hint that there
may be a preference for using evaluative dimensions
consistent with the traditions and training of one’s
professional functional area, and overall, measurement is more intense in the UK than in the Netherlands.
Discussion, Conclusions, and
Recommendations
Respondent Factors
Duration of employment
0
Experience in NPD
0
Functional area
4
It is agreed widely that the notion of complexity is
inherent in the NPD efforts of industrial companies.
However, it is agreed equally that this complexity can
and should be managed for the successful development of new products. One means of doing so is by
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establishing guideposts against which management
activity can be evaluated, controlled, and modified if
needed throughout the NPD process. The significance
of the latter becomes apparent if one considers the
ever increasing costs of NPD and the detrimental
effects to the firms’ resources if they commit to the
wrong project.
Research in the past has outlined a number of
criteria used by firms to evaluate new product
projects. Research also has demonstrated that as
these projects progress, they impose different requirements to the firm’s management and its operational
resources. Therefore, it is logical to assume that the
evaluative criteria used per gate of the NPD process
should reflect the different tasks and competencies
required at the corresponding stages. Yet evidence
in support of this assumption is only scant,
thus producing an incomplete picture of the NPD
measuring processes in industrial firms. The present
study aimed to fill a part of this gap in extant
knowledge.
Our findings first show that companies use
different criteria at different NPD evaluation gates.
While such criteria as technical feasibility, intuition,
and market potential are stressed in the early screening gates of the NPD process, a focus on product
performance, quality, and staying within the development budget are considered of paramount importance after the product has been developed. Customer
acceptance and satisfaction and unit sales are primary
considerations during and after market launch. Our
study also produced interesting patterns of usage of
evaluative dimensions over the NPD process. The
market acceptance dimension permeates the entire
NPD process and gains in prominence during the
short- and long-term performance evaluation after
launch. As we argued earlier, this may be attributed
to the continuous attention to customer acceptance
and satisfaction paid by the firms in our sample.
From a theoretical point of view this is noteworthy,
as marketing theory always has advocated in favor of
a continuous orientation to the needs of the customer
[29]. Furthermore, the fact that this orientation
permeates the whole NPD process is a first indication
that despite specific considerations at each stage (e.g.,
conceptual, technical, financial, and market), firms
attempt to impose an overall layer of customer and
marketing orientation. We speculate that this may
enable them to listen and react to the ‘‘voice of the
customer’’ in a systematic and coherent way alongside
the whole spectrum of their NPD efforts.
S. HART ET AL.
The financial dimension emerges prominently in
the business analysis gate and gains importance in the
short- and long-term performance evaluation after
launch. Again, use of this dimension corresponds to
the requirements of the specific stage. Evaluation
criteria of a financial nature may assist management
to assess the efficiency and effectiveness of their
efforts and to identify whether their products need
additional support, a rejuvenating injection of capital
or a strategy of deletion to give way to other products
or release resources for other NPD projects.
As expected, the product performance evaluative
dimension figures strongly in the product and market
testing gates. This, we suggest, reflects management
efforts to avoid go-errors that have to do with the
launch of ‘‘technical dogs’’ or ‘‘better mousetraps no
one wants’’ [5]. Our set of additional criteria proved
to be especially relevant in the idea-screening gate.
Consideration of product uniqueness, market potential, and technical feasibility at the early stages of the
NPD project reflects, we argue, a tendency of our
sampled firms to follow a balanced yet holistic
approach in their NPD efforts.
From a managerial point of view, the above
patterns may provide useful guidelines for focusing
attention and expending resources during the entire
NPD process. We argue that the informed use of
evaluation criteria as guideposts for increased managerial attention and identification of problems may
help management to prevent drop- and go-errors in
their innovation efforts. Managers may compare and
contrast findings from this study with their own NPD
practices and, by doing so, may enrich the knowledge
pool upon which they draw to make well-informed
decisions. We suggest that, among other things, three
key issues emerged for managers.
First, we recommend that managers should strive
to develop and to implement evaluative criteria
targeted to the specific requirements and expectations
from each stage of their NPD project. This, we argue,
will allow them to detect problems and to identify
opportunities as they occur. Moreover, although not
considered in this article, carefully focused evaluative
criteria allow management to allocate responsibility
and to exercise control that reflects managerial
fairness and justice.
Second, we recommend that managers should
‘‘listen to the voice of the customer’’ throughout
their NPD process. This can be accomplished by
evaluating each stage of their NPD process, among
other things, with customer acceptance and customer
INDUSTRIAL COMPANIES’ EVALUATION CRITERIA IN NEW PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT GATES
satisfaction in mind. Of course, as suggested earlier,
management should consider evaluative criteria that
are aligned to the requirement and expectations of
each stage, yet customer acceptance and satisfaction
emerged as evaluative criteria with high usage along
the whole spectrum of NPD activities in our sampled
firms.
Third, it was interesting to find that the pattern of
evaluative dimensions used over the NPD gates was
similar across subgroups of respondents. Although
the present study did not include all possible relevant
firm-level, NPD-program level, and respondent factors, those mentioned frequently in the literature were
investigated. These findings suggest that it is not
important how large the company is, what their
market share position is, what the driver of NPD is,
what innovation strategy they follow, and what kind
of new products they develop. All firms likely should
measure their NPD processes (in terms of the
evaluative dimensions) in a pattern consistent with
the one found for our samples to assess the
attractiveness of new product opportunities at different stages of development.
Limitations and Further Research Directions
This research project has helped define better the
complexity and structure of NPD measuring processes in industrial firms. However, as with all
research, the methods employed have inherent
limitations, which lead to opportunities to improve
future research in this area.
First, we asked respondents to answer the questions in relation to representative new products they
had developed and had launched in the previous five
years. This retrospective methodology has several
limitations. For example, halo bias effects may be
present because the performance of the new products
chosen was known prior to completing the survey.
There also may be differences between respondents’
recalled and actual measurements. For example,
selectivity of recall, rationality bias, and reconstruction bias may cause respondents to bias upwardly
their responses in order to make their firms look
good.
Second, this research investigated the use of criteria
across several NPD evaluation gates. An obvious next
step would be to measure the perceived importance of
the criteria at the different evaluation gates. Although
it may be suggested that the frequency of use of a
J PROD INNOV MANAG
2003;20:22–36
35
certain criterion reflects, or is related to, the
importance of measuring this criterion, additional
research is necessary to substantiate this. A third
limitation is that this research is based on what
managers reported that they have done. Thus, the
research is descriptive, providing insight only into the
number and nature of criteria used at the evaluation
gates. While this is useful, it would be even more
helpful if we could tell them what to do. For example,
by contrasting successful with unsuccessful firms, or
successful with failed new products, differences may
appear in the criteria that are used at the evaluation
gates.
The striking similarities that were identified in our
results across subgroups of respondents may indicate
that heterogeneity of samples in research investigating
NPD evaluation criteria need not bias the results.
However, we also suggest using alternative lenses for
detecting any differences or similarities in the use of
NPD evaluative criteria. For example, an analysis
comparing emerging (new economy) with traditional
sectors (old economy) may produce additional insights to this subject. Also, we suggest that in line with
our earlier discussion, one would expect differences in
the use of evaluative criteria on the basis of
differences on strategic objectives set or other
situational and environmental conditions surrounding particular NPD projects. For example, researchers should examine whether time pressures and hostile
competitive environments moderate both the number
and relative importance of evaluative criteria used per
stage of the NPD process. The type of the NPD
project may call for the use of additional evaluative
criteria as in the work of Hauser [22]. Also,
collaborative NPD projects may require development
and implementation of different evaluation criteria.
Furthermore, differences in the number of criteria
used by Dutch and UK companies deserve further
attention. Country variations in the average size of
firms and the functional background of the respondents in our sample suggest that there may be value in
research seeking to assess if such variations may
moderate the number of evaluation criteria used at
different gates of the NPD process.
Finally, as evaluative criteria may reflect areas
where managerial attention is directed, one can expect
a link between evaluative criteria used and strategic
and operational capabilities of the firm. Researchers
examining this link may find an excellent opportunity
for integrating strategic concepts into the theory and
practice of NPD. Overall, results of this project
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S. HART ET AL.
increase the current state of knowledge with regard to
the pool of criteria used by management to safeguard
the success of their NPD efforts. The significance of
the latter can be outlined by referring to Cooper and
Kleinschmidt [10] who stated, ‘‘If businesses are to
survive and prosper, managers must become astute at
selecting new product winners, and at effectively
managing the process from idea to launch.’’
22. Hart, S. and Baker, M. Learning from success: multiple
convergent processing in new product development. International
Marketing Review 11(1):77–92 (1994).
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